Library by Design

Up Close: Bright Lights, Gig City in Chattanooga | Library by Design

By Sarah Bayliss on October 23, 2012 Leave a Comment

For Chattanooga, having a gigabit-per-second connection means an opportunity to attract new business. The city is even sponsoring a competition in which entrepreneurs with winning ideas receive financial incentives to move to Chattanooga. Similarly, Director Corinne Hill, along with CPL’s new assistant director for technology and digital initiatives Nate Hill, hopes to turn the library into a creative hub that will include a competitive art and technology residency program, drawing cutting-edge talent to the library and its community.

Filed Under: Featured, Future of Libraries, Library by Design, Library Services, LJ in Print, Technology Tagged With: Chattanooga, Corinne Hill, gigabit, Nate Hill

What’s Hot: The Latest in Library Products & Furnishings | Library by Design

By Ann Kim on October 22, 2012 Leave a Comment

Compiled by Ann Kim ARCHIVAL Freeze! Keep photographic materials in like-new condition with the Photo and Negative Cold Storage Kit. Preserve photographic slides, prints, and negatives. Cold storage ensures proper climate control up to several hundred times longer than room temperature storage. List Price: $31.25. Gaylord, 800-448-6160, www.gaylord.com Stuck on you For bookbinding and repair, [...]

Filed Under: Industry News, Library by Design, LJ in Print

Looking to Apple for Tech Lab Inspiration | Library by Design

By Sarah Bayliss on October 16, 2012 Leave a Comment

THE COLORS OF TECHNOLOGY Cleveland PL’s TechCentral uses as much white as possible to focus on the multimedia. A mural-sized orange-and-green tile wall was grandfathered into the space, and lighting on its back edge makes the colors pop. Orange-coated employees assist users, who will sit in orange chairs in front of computer stations displaying “curvy, custom craftsmanship” that allows the work spaces to work together

Challenge: How to turn an ornately designed, inconveniently shaped basement into a sleek, technology-driven community space? This was the question that Bostwick Design Partnership faced when taking on the task of creating TechCentral, Cleveland Public Library’s new technology center on the lower level of the library’s downtown Louis Stokes Wing.

Filed Under: Featured, Library by Design, Library Services, LJ in Print, Technology Tagged With: design, inspiration, Library by Design, tech lab

Librarians Pick Their Favorite Furniture for Teens | Library by Design

By Bette-Lee Fox on October 15, 2012 Leave a Comment

Surprising, stunning, outrageous even—that’s what teens asked for and hot in these library spaces.

Filed Under: Library by Design, LJ in Print, Youth Services Tagged With: design, furniture, lbd, Library by Design, space, teens

The Best of Interior Design: Public and Academic Library Winners | Library by Design

By Sarah Bayliss on October 2, 2012 1 Comment

Attendees of the annual American Library Association (ALA) conference in Anaheim, CA, this past June got an overview of stellar new library interior design when ALA’s Library Leadership and Management Association (LLAMA) and the International Interior Design Association (IIDA) announced the winners of the latest ALA/IIDA Library Interior Design Competition. The biennial awards honor excellence [...]

Filed Under: Academic Libraries, Featured, Library by Design, LJ in Print Tagged With: design, interior design, lbd, Library by Design, winners

How To Design Library Space with Kids in Mind | Library by Design

By Traci Engel Lesneski on October 2, 2012 2 Comments

When creating special spaces where children can experience joy in learning and investigation, public and school libraries often are inclined to produce primary-colored themed spaces that may appear on the surface to be kid-friendly. These spaces, however, can be a flat experience for children. Children appreciate good design, subtlety, and nuance. We should avoid talking down to them with the spaces we provide just for them.

Filed Under: Featured, Library by Design, Library Services, LJ in Print, Youth Services Tagged With: design, kids, lbd, Library by Design, space

The Six Space Challenges Librarians and Architects Tackled at Design Institute Denver | Library by Design

By LJ on September 24, 2012 1 Comment

Sheridan Public Library, Arapahoe Library District CO Architect Humphries Poli Architects THE CHALLENGE Sheridan Public Library must leave its decades-long home in the local high school and construct a new building nearby. This new facility needs more room for teens as well as resources for the large Spanish-speaking and elderly constituencies, and the mandate for [...]

Filed Under: Featured, Library by Design, Managing Libraries Tagged With: design challenges, lbd, Library by Design

Building for the Future: Design Institute Overview | Library by Design

By Meredith Schwartz on September 24, 2012 Leave a Comment

How do you plan for a future you can’t predict? By building flexibility into the design. That was one of the main takeaways from LJ’s latest Design Institute (DI), held at the Denver Central Library on May 4. The DI, LJ’s 12th in a series on trends in library design, was a one-day symposium composed of panels, presentations, and breakout sessions, featuring a mix of architects, vendors, and librarians.

Filed Under: Featured, Future of Libraries, Library by Design, LJ in Print Tagged With: Library by Design

Customizing User Design To Fit Your Community’s Needs | Library by Design

By Marta Murvosh on September 18, 2012 2 Comments

The challenge of providing services to a changing community while operating more efficiently made the Denver Public Library’s (DPL) leaders realize they couldn’t afford to be all things to all people—at least not at every branch.

After zeroing in on each branch’s demographics and user patterns, librarians ascertained three different user groups and developed different strategies, such as refining the service delivery, and put them into play in 2005 and 2006. “It really is borrowed from marketing from the business world,” says Susan Kotarba, director of public services at DPL.

Filed Under: Library by Design, Library Services, LJ in Print, Managing Libraries Tagged With: Denver Public Library, design, User Design

How a Small Net-Zero Energy Library Got the World’s Attention | Library by Design

By Rebekkah Smith Aldrich on September 17, 2012 1 Comment

The library caught the attention of the UN’s Sustainability Initiative, The Future We Want/Rio+20, for its commitment to investing in a new library facility with the goal of attaining near net-zero energy usage.